Masja Dessau

About the traditional celebration at Christmas. It is a safety valve, a cleansing bath that gives strength and zest for life well into the new year. "People meet" – and masks fall around the lavishly laid tables, where the director and the workers drink together. Local democracy works – and long-standing marriages falter! However, very few Christmas parties reach the same heights as the one enjoyed by the staff at Simonsens Bijouteri Fabrik.

Anders Refn's film adaptation of Gustav Wied's novel stars Jens Okking and Helle Hertz in the leading roles as Baron Helmuth and his wife Alvilda. The baron is deeply enamored with his wife, but she is repelled by his blunt and coarse nature and is drawn to her cousin, who fulfills her desire for passionate romance.

Based on Leif Panduro's 1958 satire classic. David, a senior high-school student, aims a swift kick at his principal's behind and is committed to a psychiatric ward from the perspective of which he takes a close look at his allegedly sane family. They, of course, are the real loonies. The psychiatrists are worse. Only lovely class-mate Lis is down-to-earth and trustworthy.

About a businessman who murders his stepdaughter after having an affair with her. A crematorium worker who secretly sells coffins to an undertaker discovers two bodies in one of the coffins one day. He suspects what has happened and tries to blackmail the murderer for money.

A youth film set in the summer of 1945, when the war in Europe has finally ended. For 17-year-old Herbert and his schoolmate Allan, their regular hangout is the Munich Inn, where Leo Mathisen's orchestra plays. The orchestra's drummer, Spjæt, is Herbert's idol, while Allan is more interested in the cloakroom attendant Anita than in the music. Herbert lives alone with his mother, who is a pianist. He has a job as a delivery boy at a grocery store, but supplements his income by trading on the black market. The black market goods, which can be sold at the München Kroen, are obtained in exchange for things Herbert has stolen from his mother or the grocer. Eventually, he even sells his mother's grand piano. A black American officer, whom he has befriended, intervenes when the business starts to go too far.

A group of better-off thirty-somethings meet for a weekend in Knud and Beth's home. The host couple is prone to bickering regularly. The married couples (Jan and Ilse, and Kjeld and Tove) that are visiting understand and try to stay out of the way. Bachelor Lars, however, comes into his own and is a constant source of provocative comments.

Claus celebrates his promotion with a night out on the town. Ebbesen wants to close a workshop and Allan gets fired. Ulla, who is bored in her marriage, rekindles her old relationship with Allan and tries to find evidence against Ebbesen's shady dealings. Ulla and Allan flee together and make plans against Ebbesen, but the police are ready for them when they arrive.

Christian is a nice man climbing the career ladder. His brother Mikael, on the other hand, is a petty criminal who hustles his way through life as best he can. When Mikael dies, Christian feels responsible and, in order to get to know his deceased brother better, he seeks out the underworld Mikael belonged to. He should never have done that.

Tonnemann is a ship painter and a single dad to two kids. He's also deaf and mute, and a really imaginative guy. Every night, his little son Absalon waits for him at the harbor to walk him home through the streets. This is an original TV drama and a popular breakthrough for Ronild.

Matador is a Danish TV series produced and shown between 1978 and 1982. It is set in the fictional Danish town of Korsbæk between 1929 and 1947. It follows the lives of a range of characters from across the social spectrum, focusing specifically on the rivalry between the families of two businessmen: The banker Hans Christian Varnæs, an established local worthy, and social climber Mads Skjern, who arrives in town as the series opens. The name Matador was taken from the localised edition of the boardgame Monopoly, also the series' tentative English title. In addition, in contemporary Danish a "matador" is often used to describe a business tycoon, in the series referring to the character of Mads Skjern and his craftiness as a self-made entrepreneur. Directed by famed Danish film maker Erik Balling, Matador was the idea of author Lise Nørgaard who wrote the bulk of the episodes alongside Karen Smith, Jens Louis Petersen and Paul Hammerich. The series is one of the most well-known and popular examples of Danish television and represents the peak of longtime development of Danish TV drama by the public service channel Danmarks Radio. The series has become part of the modern self-understanding of Danes, partly because of its successful mix of melodrama and a distinct warm Danish humour in the depiction of characters, which were portrayed by a wide range of the most popular Danish actors at the time; but also not least because of its accurate portrayal of a turbulent Denmark from around the start of the Great Depression and through Nazi Germany's occupation of Denmark in World War II.